Coed
by Abagail Snow
Summary: Katniss can't get the boy across the hall off her mind. Modern day, college.


_Written for day 5 of __**promptsinpanem**__ on tumblr for the seven deadly sins, this one is for lust._

* * *

"The bathrooms will be coed, unless that's going to be a problem," Finnick, the RA announces during the first floor meeting.

Katniss doesn't think much of it. The bathrooms may be labeled as "Mens" and "Womens" separately, but she saw into the men's room earlier and there weren't urinals or anything. And the showers are long and narrow with a space to change between the curtain and stall door if she wants to.

Still, Madge blushes beside her and then winks as if it's a big deal, and Katniss wonders if this is something she should be worried about. They take a vote and no one raises their hands against it.

* * *

"He's cute," Madge comments from her desk chair, watching as the boy across the hall hoists his comforter set onto the top bunk.

Katniss sits on her bed and flips through a coursebook, only glancing up briefly before returning her attention to the books she'll need to buy for this semester.

The boy's door is propped open with a toaster oven, Katniss notices, which they're not allowed to have in the dorms, but Madge has smuggled an illegal microwave in as well, one that Katniss plans to use regularly, so she's not in the position to judge.

"It's an open door policy," Madge explains to him and extends a fork bent at a 45 degree angle to form a makeshift doorstop. Finnick had passed them out earlier, during the floor meeting, which the boy obviously didn't attend.

"I'm Madge," she says.

He turns around and wipes his hands on his gym shorts before taking her hand. "Peeta," he says, accepting the fork and wedging it in the carpet beneath the door.

He's not very tall, not compared to Madge, who wears enormous heels, but he's got a strong build, with a square jaw and blonde curls, which flop across his forehead as he pulls open another cardboard box to unload. Madge is right. He's cute.

Katniss tries not to stare as she studies him from a distance, but just then he looks across the hall and into her room, catching her in the act.

"Hello," he says with a wave.

"That's Katniss," Madge says. "We've been best friends since high school."

He smiles and nods at Katniss then at Madge. "Neat," he says.

"They've been doing room checks," Katniss says suddenly, not recognizing her own voice. She points at the toaster oven that now sits in the middle of the doorway, and Peeta makes a gesture in understanding before scooping it up and tucking it into the built in shelf behind the door.

"Thanks," he says, and he flashes her a grin that's so warm she finds herself returning it instantly.

"You like him," Madge teases her when they're on their way to the dining hall for dinner.

"Who?" Katniss asks, nearly dumbfounded.

"Peeta!"

"What? No," she says, her tone adamant.

"I think he likes you too," Madge continues, her voice taking on an almost sing song lilt. "The way you two were smiling all goofy at one another." She shakes her head. "It's going to happen."

Katniss still doesn't understand. "What?"

"You're going to hook up."

Katniss doesn't even bother to humor her friend. She doesn't date or hook up or any of those types of things. She's got a GPA to maintain and a full scholarship to hold onto, she's not going to jeopardize her education with distractions.

Still, that night when she bumps into Peeta in the bathroom, they brush their teeth in happy silence, and she can't help but mirror his smile.

* * *

Her friend Gale is two years older and goes to Panem U too. He lives in an apartment off campus and on Saturday night he invites Katniss and Madge to a party he's throwing. He's also friends with Finnick, her RA, and soon half the floor is going.

Katniss has only been to his apartment a few times in high school, and still isn't quite used to the party scene. She nurses a warm beer for about a half an hour, wedged uncomfortably on a futon beside Madge, who is busy flirting with one of Gale's roommates.

Peeta approaches at some point and leans against the armrest, holding up his beer to read the label. "Miller High Life, the champagne of beers," he says before taking a swig. "This is some classy party."

"Don't expect to be pampered every time," she says dryly and takes a sour sip. "Gale will be serving nothing but Milwaukee's Best for the rest of the year, and that's because he actually likes the stuff."

"You know Gale?" Peeta asks, lifting his eyebrows curiously.

Gale comes down the stairs just then and catches her attention by pointing towards the beer pong table where she'd dropped her keys earlier. They're next.

"We went to high school together," she says quickly climbing off the futon and joining Gale at the table. She doesn't see Peeta for the rest of the night.

* * *

Madge doesn't sleep in their dorm often. Early in the morning she'll slip into their room so she can shower and grab books, and at night, before bed, she'll watch TV with Katniss for a few hours before sneaking out. Katniss doesn't know where she's going, and she doesn't ask, but soon Gale is hanging around their room too.

"Are you two seeing each other?" Katniss asks Madge one night when Gale's stepped out to use the bathroom.

"Not really," Madge shrugs. "It's casual. Just hooking up."

Katniss nods as if she understands.

"That's okay, right? I mean you're not interested in him, I know you've been close for a long time."

"No, no, it's fine," she says waving her hands frantically because the idea of her and Gale is so ridiculous. "We're just friends, it's fine."

"Good," Madge says, and her smile of relief quickly turns into a playful grin. "Because that's what I told Peeta."

Katniss's eyes widen and she barely has time to react before Madge has darted out of the room and she's left staring across the hall into Peeta's room, where she catches his eye then quickly looks away.

* * *

On Halloween, res life goes door to door handing out safe sex goody bags filled with pamphlets, a handful of candy, and a couple of condoms. Katniss reaches into the bag to fish out a root beer barrel but instead comes up with a foil package. She turns it over to inspect it carefully just as Peeta passes. His eyes immediately land on the condom in her hand and he looks at her curiously.

"Trick or treat?" is the first thing she thinks to say.

"Can I have both?" he asks, leaning against his door frame.

She can feel heat flood her cheeks, but it also settles in her chest and stomach, pulsing with something new and exciting.

She tucks the condom in a jar beside her bed in case she needs it.

* * *

She thinks about him at night. She thinks about how Madge spends every night warm and pressed against a solid chest. Sometimes she thinks she wants that too.

She practices sleeping on the edge of the mattress, leaving the sliver of space she thinks Peeta would fit into. She practices the different positions. If he were spooning her, if she were spooning him, maybe if she draped herself across his chest.

It's all so embarrassing that she refuses to admit she's even thinking it.

* * *

She drinks too much at a party. It's not blackout drunk or anything, but she finds herself acting a bit more outgoing. She learns a card game from Glimmer and Clove, two girls she's barely acknowledged all year, then plays beer pong with Thresh even though she usually only partners with Gale, she even helps Cato pierce his beer with her pocket knife when he starts barking about needing to shotgun.

She has a lot of fun. More fun than she'd usually allow herself to have.

It's when she runs into Peeta that it becomes a problem. He's been drinking too, she beat him in three games of beer pong alone, and she knows that him and Thresh pregamed before the party.

His blue eyes are glassy and unfocused and while most of his weight is supported against the concrete wall, he leans into her as well for balance.

His hair is disheveled and she wants to comb her fingers through it, she thinks, just as her hand lifts and her fingers tangle into his curls. He leans in closer and the heat of his body swallows her completely, more intoxicating than any of the liquor she's consumed.

"Are you having a good time?" he slurs. His hand touches her hip then quickly drops away, leaving the exposed sliver of skin beneath the hem of her shirt on fire.

"Yeah," she says with a slight nod and her fingers leave his hair and trail down his cheek, catching the light stubble on his jaw.

"Yeah." He mimics her nod and then he laughs and she thinks he may kiss her.

They sway in this moment for a while longer, his touch brushing higher up her side, lingering just beneath her ribcage. She swallows a large breath and forgets how to breathe.

Then she hiccups. Loudly.

She jumps back to cover her mouth with her hand and hiccups again.

Peeta blinks rapidly, his concern quickly fading into amusement. "I think you've had enough," he says. She scowls at him, but her intimidating demeanor is interrupted by another hiccup. "Want me to take you home?"

They watch an episode of The Office, her from bed and him from a desk chair, while she yelps periodically. During a commercial he stands abruptly and kisses her without warning. She gasps, her heart beating impossibly fast in an instant.

"Did I scare you?" he says, his face still only an inch away. She takes a few successful breaths without disruption. He frowns and an expression that she can't quite decipher burdens his features. "Goodnight Katniss."

She doesn't want him to go though. She catches his arm before he can leave and clings to him desperately. "Stay with me," she says.

"You lust for him," Madge teases her the next morning.

Katniss's head is pounding and she can't seem to smother herself with her pillow no matter how hard she tries.

"I don't," she argues weakly.

"Then why did I find him in your bed this morning?"

Katniss pulls her comforter over her head to hide the fierce blush staining her cheeks.

* * *

Lust for him, the thought bounces around her mind. She likes him, yes, but she doesn't lust for him. She's not boy crazy like Madge or flippant like Glimmer. They have sex because they enjoy it, not because they need to have it.

Katniss doesn't have sex because she doesn't need to.

At least she didn't think she did. Now, she finds a dull ache between her legs at odd hours of the day. She clenches her thighs together tightly waiting for a reprieve that never comes.

Sometimes, in her bed, she wedges herself between the wall and her mattress where she slept when they shared a bed, and she thinks about what it would have been like if he had touched her. She remembers the feel of his fingers as they ghosted beneath her ribcage, the firmness of his lips when he had kissed her.

She imagines him kissing her again, the taste of his tongue touching hers, his fingers tangling in her braid. She wonders what his hands would have felt like cupping her breast or flicking over her nipple. She lets her hands wander there with tentative touches.

Her breath quickens and her eyes screw shut, then her fingers slip into her underwear with his name on her tongue.

* * *

"Did I do something wrong?" Peeta says, catching her off guard at the library.

She can barely meet his eye, not after the thoughts she's had of him, and instead stares at the course syllabus in her hand until the words fade away.

"What? No," she says quickly. "Midterms are coming up and I'm really behind." And it's not untrue. She's barely been able to concentrate in any of her classes. Not with fantasies of him clouding her mind.

He nods, but she can sense that he doesn't believe her. He lingers for another moment without saying anything, his hands fidgeting in his pockets.

"It's just… it seems like you've been avoiding me," he says carefully. "I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable – kissing you."

"It's fine," is all she can say. She grips her pen tightly and begins to draw circles on a page in her textbook. Now she's thinking about the kiss again and there's no way she'll be able to focus on anything else.

Maybe that's what she needs to do. She needs to get him out of her system, so there's nothing left to wonder about.

She lifts her eyes and they find his shyly. I liked it, she wants to say, but instead her chest tightens, too anxious to find words.

"I really need to study," she says.

* * *

They kiss at a party.

He tastes like beer and vodka and strawberries, and his lips are wet and slippery against hers. When his tongue dips into her mouth to touch hers, she lets out a hum from deep in the back of her throat and clings to his shirt tightly.

He pulls away and covers his face with his hand. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have," he begins to say, but already she misses kissing him. She bats away his hand and grabs a hold of his face and assures him that it's okay before they're kissing sloppily again.

They don't talk about it after.

* * *

She imagines him taking her in her bed, on her desk, against the wall in a dark hallway. In the shower, she lathers herself with soap, focusing her attention on the places where she longs for him to touch.

Her fingers move slickly between her folds, circling the swollen bud between her legs and making her knees buckle. She whimpers beneath the hot stream of water and braces herself against the tiled wall.

"Peeta," she moans.

"Katniss?"

Her eyes snap open and she's suddenly aware of the shower running in the stall beside her. In an instant she's shut off the faucet, tangled herself in a towel, and barreled out of the bathroom with clumps of shampoo still tangled in her hair.

She locks herself in her room and hides beneath her comforter.

"Are you coming to the party tonight?" Madge asks an hour later, lifting the corner of her blanket to peer at her.

"I think I'm sick," she lies, although it's not untrue. She feels like she's going to throw up, she's so embarrassed.

"Do you want me to stay with you?" Madge says, and it's obvious she doesn't want to.

Katniss would rather be alone anyway and encourages her to go.

By 10PM, the floor is nearly a ghost town.

She missed dinner while barricaded in her room and she's hungry now. Plus, her hair is kind of crusty from shampoo and she'd like to rinse it out.

She checks through the peephole on her door to make sure Peeta's door is closed. He's at the party, she assumes, along with everyone else.

She slips into the shower and finishes cleaning her hair, then ties her wet hair into a knot on top of her head.

Picking up a packet of Ramen from her shelf, she heads down to the kitchen to prepare it. She's passing the lounge when she hears a thunderous crack. Peeta's in there playing pool and he leans against his pool cue while he debates his next shot.

Katniss darts past the lounge before he can notice her, running all the way to the kitchen, where she collapses against the wall to catch her breath. She makes her Ramen and sits in the window that overlooks campus while she eats.

She can't get back to her dorm room without passing the lounge again. That is unless she takes the elevator to another floor then comes up the stairwell. She's about to cross the hallway to the elevator bank when she sees Peeta at the end of the hall, coming out of his room with a bottle of Gatorade in hand.

Their eyes meet.

"Decided to stay in tonight too?" he says, and smiles warmly at her, as if she hadn't made a complete fool of herself hours before.

"Yeah," she says shyly.

He walks down the hall a few steps and pauses outside of the lounge. "Want the next game?" he says and nods towards the pool table.

She hesitates. "Sure," she says, surprised when the word tumbles out of her mouth.

He racks a game of Nine-ball and breaks when Katniss declines. The three ball goes in, so he lines up the shot for the one ball. He's not very good though, and the ball is deflected against a wall and away from any of the pockets.

Katniss takes her turn, aligning the one ball with the nine, ending the game with a single stroke.

"Well that was fun," he says dryly.

"Sorry."

"I was kind of hoping you'd be bad," he admits, bouncing the cue ball against the far wall of the table. "And you'd let me teach you."

"Oh?"

He blushes and shakes his head with a chuckle. "Wow, that sounded sort of misogynistic, didn't it?" He pauses, and when his eyes lock with hers they're clouded with a darkness she doesn't recognize. It takes her breath away. "It's this fantasy I have."

"How–" her voice cracks. "How does it go?"

He licks his lips, causing her stomach to clench. He rounds the pool table and extends his pool cue to her. "You, uh, you need help lining up your shot." He guides her to where the cue ball is.

She positions the pool stick to take a shot by bending over the edge of the table, her backside connecting with his groin in the process.

"Is this right?" she says over her shoulder.

Peeta's eyes shut tightly and he lets out a groan. Instantly she feels him begin to harden against her, sending a surge of heat straight to her core. She swivels her hips against his experimentally, and he grips her waist to angle her movement over his erection.

"And then I show you this trick," he says, and his voice is so low, it sounds like a different person. One hand slides down her arm placed on the table, and the other ghosts up her side and past her breast to her elbow. She shivers against the warmth of his chest, which has swallowed her completely with his body pressed against hers.

He aligns her elbow so that it's high, and hangs like a pivot. "Now shoot straight," he murmurs into her ear.

She releases the cue and it scratches the table, leaving a blue trail in the felt, but she doesn't care because his lips are hot on her neck, and his arm has wrapped around her waist to massage her breast, and he's thrusting against her and it all feels so deliriously good.

"Is this what you think of, Katniss?" he says, dipping his hand between her legs where she touched herself for him before.

Her elbow buckles and she collapses against the table, biting her lip to keep from screaming.

"Yes," she whimpers.

He slips his fingers beneath the waistband of her shorts and underwear, and her hips jerk back when she feels his finger sweep between her wet lips.

"What was I doing to you in the shower today?" he says against her neck just as his finger plunges inside her.

"Th – this." She shudders when he circles her throbbing clit.

He presses more firmly. "Like this?"

"Yes," she cries. "Yes."

"What's another one of your fantasies?"

She turns in his arms to face him and rolls onto her toes to keep in contact with the ministrations of his fingers. Her lips touch his and she kisses him hungrily, her tongue exploring every inch of his mouth.

He begins to lift her onto the edge of the pool table, but she stills him, instead slipping his hand from her shorts and dropping to her knees.

His jaw is agape, and he braces himself against the table when her hand tentatively touches his tented gym shorts.

"You think about this?" he says, cheeks flushed and smile sheepish.

She licks her lips and nods, then loosens the drawstring of his shorts to lower them down his hips, freeing his hardened cock.

She flicks her tongue over the tip, and he groans his approval. She wraps her small hand around his shaft and closes her lips around his head, bobbing her head and pumping her hand in unison. One hand settles at the nape of her neck and he guides her movement, urging his cock more deeply into her mouth.

She cups his sac in her other hand and massages him gently. "Shit, Katniss," Peeta hisses, tugging her hair roughly when his hand balls into a fist. His body becomes rigid and he frantically brushes her away. "Not yet," he says, his breath labored. "I don't want to come yet."

She nods and rises when he gestures for her to stand. He hoists her onto the pool table and his lips find her throat, licking his way to the neckline of her tank top to the valley between her breast. He settles between her legs and thrusts against her shorts.

"I want to be inside you so bad," he murmurs against her skin.

And she nods wordlessly.

* * *

It doesn't help, getting physical with him. Before, when she wasn't thinking about sex, she was almost functioning like a normal human being. Now when she isn't thinking about sex, she's having it.

Madge teases her constantly. She bangs on the door whenever it's closed and shouts, "Are you decent?" so that everyone on the floor can hear.

Peeta thinks it's funny, but Katniss is embarrassed by the attention.

She never thought she'd be so fueled by her hormones.

But when he hitches her legs over his shoulders and strokes her with his tongue, she's too drunk with lust to care.


End file.
